Lifeline Policies

Policies

Lifeline Australia recognises the importance of protecting your privacy. Please follow this link to access our complete Privacy Policy. Also, you can visit this page for information on our FAQ - Privacy Collection Notice page.

Information Security Policy Statement

This policy statement sets out Lifeline Australia’s information security objectives and commitment to deliver highly available crisis support and suicide prevention services to all Australians experiencing emotional distress.

Access the policy: Information Security Policy Statement

Social Media Policy

This policy provides all Lifeline employees, volunteers, and supporters with the corporate requirements and guidance to practically apply, develop and manage any Lifeline website and/or social media channels.

Access the olicy: Social Media Policy

Lifeline's Registered Training Organisation Complaints Policy

You can download our policy here.

Terms of Use

Please find the terms and conditions for our crisis support below. If you have any feedback, please visit our Contact Us page.

Lifeline Crisis Support Services

Terms of use

1. Purpose

Lifeline Australia takes active measures to ensure the availability of safe, effective, and quality services to people who access its Crisis Support services (Service), as well as ensuring the safety of employees and volunteers who deliver these services.

Lifeline Australia (Lifeline) acknowledges that at times help seekers may display unwelcome calling behaviours, which may be demonstrated through one-time or a series of ongoing interactions with the service. Lifeline also acknowledges the potential and imminent health risks to help seekers who contact the service frequently or on a consistent basis through the repetition of sharing their story and the limitations of the service as a single point contact service for people who are in crisis, distressed, suicidal or supporting someone in crisis. A further consideration is the impact to other help seekers accessing the service due to, at times, a high volume of unwelcome calling behaviour.

As part of its commitment to safety, Lifeline has developed this guideline to ensure the service is used appropriately and as intended by Lifeline and its funders and includes set parameters in managing unwelcome behaviour by providing greater protective measures for current and future help seekers of the service as well as employees and volunteers of Lifeline.

Where appropriate, these terms of use should be read in conjunction with Lifeline Australia’s policies which can be accessed at lifeline policies

2. Rights and responsibilities of help seekers

Lifeline acknowledges the rights of help seekers to:

Be treated with respect, dignity, and without judgement
Expect that privacy and confidentiality will be upheld and to the extent that the law permits, including confidential conversations with Crisis Supporters
Be provided with accurate information and referrals
Make a complaint or provide feedback about the Crisis Support service interaction and expect to have the compliant or feedback handled and investigated (where applicable) appropriately
Have their call recorded should they wish to do so (where call recording is applicable). Help seekers accept their responsibilities to:
- Be respectful to Crisis Support workers and other employees and volunteers of Lifeline at all times
- Use this service within the parameters set by these terms of use (see below for outline of Criteria to determine unwelcome calling behaviours)

3. Rights and responsibilities of Lifeline Australia

Lifeline Australia acknowledges its rights and responsibilities to:

Take active measures to provide quality telephone, text and chat services
Reserve the right to suspend or discontinue services relating to breaches of this guideline
May provide alternative service experience, such as clinical case management
Maintain the help seekers privacy in line with the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth), unless the help seeker is at risk of harm to themselves or others in which case the relevant federal or state based legislation will be followed
Reserves the right to not have calls recorded by service users.

4. Criteria to determine unwelcome calling behaviours

Lifeline views the following criteria to be inappropriate behaviours when using the service, including but not limited to:

Death threats
Threats of physical or psychological harm or violence towards the Crisis Supporter and/or any other employees or volunteers, or property of Lifeline
Sexually violent
Sexual harassment
Abusive interactions towards a Crisis Supporter
Inappropriate religious, cultural or racial insults
Homophobic, sexist or other derogatory remarks
Unwelcome communications made at consistent and/or regular intervals
Overuse of the Service including five (5) or more interactions over a 24 hour period
Prank calls.

5. What the service does provide

The service offers confidential, one-to-one support for anyone across Australia who is experiencing a personal crisis, distress, having difficulty coping, contemplating suicide, or supporting someone in crisis. The service is operational 24/7 via phone, text, or online chat and are provided by Crisis Supporters who have undertaken extensive training in the Lifeline Australia’s Crisis Support framework. Crisis Supporters are trained to listen, provide support, and refer appropriately. Under the Crisis Support framework, the service is designed as a one- time contact for people as outlined above.

Crisis Supporters may assist people who are experiencing loneliness to work through their feelings and thoughts so that the help seeker can establish their own strategies to improve social connections in their life. Where a help seeker makes regular contact with the service for social reasons, the Crisis Supporter may limit the conversation to be available for help seekers who are in crisis situations or at imminent risk. Lifeline reserves the right to manage such calls appropriately.

Lifeline caters to people with hearing impairment, through the National Relay Service, and non- English speakers, through the Translating and Interpreting Services. Further information is available on our website at Language Support.

6. What the service does not provide

Medical advice, diagnosis, prescriptions for medications, or treatment for medical conditions
Psychological treatment including counselling, case management, or therapy Friendship, intimate relationships, or information sharing of Crisis Supporters personal information

Consistent, ongoing, or long-term support (help seekers are encouraged to discuss longer term support strategies with their doctor, therapist, or other support services who provide longer term support).

7. Restrictions to the service

If a help seeker is deemed by the Crisis Supporter to be displaying unwelcome calling behaviour (as outlined in Criteria to determine unwelcome calling behaviours section), the Crisis Supporter may follow these procedures to include:

Provide a warning to the help seeker that the behaviour is inappropriate and/or unwelcome including a brief explanation of how the behaviour is inappropriate

Where the help seeker continues with unwelcome calling behaviour, the Crisis Supporter may terminate the call, and may refer to authorities.

8. Escalation of unacceptable behaviour

Where there is frequent or ongoing unwelcome calling behaviour by the help seeker, Lifeline will assess the situation on an individual basis and decide what further actions are required. These may include:

Setting restrictions on access to the service
Cease or suspend access to the service
Engage with authorities and/or take protective action through law enforcement
Escalate the matter under the Telecommunication Act 1979 (Cth) for further warnings and/or suspension from the service.

9. Appeals

Lifeline takes active measures to ensure the provision of quality service to all Australians who experience crisis situations, and has robust processes to manage feedback, complaints, and incident management.

In the event that services are suspended or discontinued due to either unwelcome calling behaviour or where outside the service provision scope, the help seeker may appeal or provide feedback via the Lifeline Australia website at Contact us.

10. Privacy

Lifeline securely stores transcripts of text and online chat interactions, and recordings of telephone conversations where consent by the help seeker has been granted. These transcripts and recordings may be used for the primary purposes outlined in the Privacy Policy.

For important information regarding access to your personal information, and further information about how we treat your personal information please refer to our Privacy Policy.

In situations where Lifeline believe that life is in immediate danger, Lifeline has a duty of care to contact emergency services. In these circumstances, Lifeline will disclose any identifiable and relevant information obtained during a Crisis Support interaction or conversation to emergency services.

Calls to 13 11 14 from mobiles are free, this includes prepaid and post-paid customers. Most calls from a landline will be charged at the cost of a local call. Additional charges may apply for some home phone plans. For more information on call costs please contact your telephone provider.

Texts to Lifeline’s 0477 13 11 14 Crisis Text service will be charged at the cost of a local text message.

Use of Lifeline’s Crisis Chat service is dependent upon an active internet connection, the costs for which will be determined by your Internet Service Provider. We estimate data consumption for the Crisis Chat service to be approx. 2.5mb for initial connection, and 120kb per hour thereafter, however these figures can vary based on your conversation and data connection.

Lifeline crisis support services are for people living in Australia only.

Please find the terms and conditions for our crisis support below. If you have any feedback, please visit our Contact Us page.

Important note: If life is in immediate danger please call 000 for police or ambulance

Purpose and effect of Terms of Use

By using the Lifeline Australia Limited (we, us, our) website and website services you agree to these Terms of Use.

We may change the Terms of Use by making the revised terms available on this website. By continuing to use our website you accept the Terms of Use as they apply from time to time.

It is intended that these Terms of Use will be legally binding on you and us, and governed by the laws of New South Wales, Australia.

Our website and website services

Our website and services are provided for the use of residents of Australia only.

Please note that our Service terms of use form part of these Terms of Use and also apply to your use of our website services, including 'Text Us' and 'Chat with us'.

Our 'Text Us' and 'Chat with us' services aim to provide immediate, accessible, short-term help to people needing support to deal with current problems that are overwhelming their capacity to cope and may be threatening their safety.

While we take reasonable care in the provision of our services, we do not guarantee continuous and uninterrupted access to our website and services. If you experience difficulty in accessing 'Text Us' or 'Chat with us', you may access our 24/7 crisis support service by calling 13 11 14.

Reliance on information and disclaimer

While we take reasonable care, and implement quality assurance protocols, to ensure that the information and services we provide are relevant, helpful and responsive, please note that:

the information on our website is intended for your general information and use only and we do not warrant the information is complete, accurate and up to date;
our website and services do not provide medical advice, diagnosis, prescription of medications, or treatment of any conditions;
our website and services are not a substitute or alternative to professional health care and advice based on your unique circumstances; and
you should not disregard professional advice, or delay seeking it, because of any information or guidance from our website or services.

On this basis, to the extent permitted by law:

we exclude all statutory and general law warranties and guarantees in relation to our website and website services;
we disclaim all liability (including for negligence) for any injury, loss or damage incurred by you arising out of your use and reliance on the information and guidance provided through our website and website services; and
our liability for failure to comply with any applicable (and non-excludable) guarantees under the Australian Consumer Law is limited to supplying the services again or paying the cost of having the services supplied again.

Copyright and trademarks

All material on this website (including its design, layout, text, and images) is subject to copyright owned by (or licensed to) us.

We are happy for you to reproduce this material for personal and non-commercial purposes, provided the reproduction is unaltered and an attribution of source is included. Any other use of this material requires our written consent.

This website contains trade marks belong to us and third parties. You may not display or use these trade marks in any manner without the prior consent of the trade mark owner.

Links to other websites and third party content

This website contains links to, or content from, third party websites. These are provided for your convenience only. We do not control third party websites and are not responsible for their content. We do not specifically endorse any organisation or content, and views or recommendations provided do not necessarily reflect our views. It is your responsibility to make your own decisions about the currency, completeness, accuracy of this information. We do not warrant that material on other sites does not infringe the intellectual property rights of any other person.

Privacy, security and viruses

We take our obligations to protect your personal information seriously, please see our Privacy Policy

However, please note that the internet is an insecure public network which means there are risks that information sent to or from our website services may be intercepted, corrupted or modified by third parties. In addition, it is possible that files and transmissions through our website services may contain computer viruses, disabling codes, worms or other devices or defects.

You bear the risks and responsibility for any loss or damage caused, directly or indirectly, by these risks. We do not accept any liability for any interference with or damage to your computer system, device, software or data occurring in connection with your use of our website and website services.

Cookies

When you interact with us through this website, we may use a feature of your browser called a cookie to assign your computer a ‘User ID’. Cookies do not contain information by which we can identify you. They identify your computer to our servers. We may use information contained in cookies to improve the functionality of this website and for security purposes. You may configure your browser so that you are notified before a cookie is downloaded or so that your browser does not accept cookies (please refer to the help menu within your Internet browser).

Lifeline Training Terms and Conditions of Use - Customers

TERMS AND CONDITIONS OF USE

Last updated on 5 July 2021

A PDF version can be downloaded here.

In order to access or use any services, materials, content, program or information provided by Lifeline Australia (ACN 081 031 263) ("Lifeline") ("Lifeline Content") to you in any manner whatsoever, including by hard copy or on any digital platform, you must read, agree and accept all of the following Terms and Conditions.

By electronically accepting the Terms and Conditions, you agree to be bound by the Terms and Conditions, and any Lifeline policies that are either accessible at https://www.lifeline.org.au/policies-page/ or notified to you from time to time.

The Terms and Conditions are effective and binding on and from the date of acceptance of the Terms and Conditions. Lifeline reserves the right to update and amend the Terms and Conditions in accordance with Clause 10. You can review the latest version of these Terms and Conditions at any time at https://www.lifeline.org.au/policies-page/.

1. Intellectual Property Rights

1.1 You acknowledge and agree that nothing in these Terms and Conditions has the effect of transferring the ownership of any intellectual property rights, proprietary rights and related rights, anywhere in the world, registered or unregistered, including the rights to patents, copyright, designs, trade marks, know-how, inventions, trade secrets and any application or right to apply for registration of any of the aforementioned rights (collectively, "Intellectual Property Rights") of a party.

1.2 Lifeline owns all rights, title and interests in the Lifeline Content, including all associated Intellectual Property Rights.

1.3 You acknowledge and agree that Lifeline owns the Intellectual Property Rights in the Lifeline Content on and from creation, including for the avoidance of doubt throughout the duration of your use or access of the Lifeline Content.

2. Third Party IP

2.1 You acknowledge and agree that the Lifeline Content may contain the Intellectual Property Rights of a third party that has been licensed to Lifeline ("Third Party IP").

2.2 You must not do anything, or cause anything to be done, that will cause Lifeline to breach the rights granted to Lifeline for any Third Party IP, and must comply with any directions given by Lifeline in relation to Third Party IP.

2.3 You agree to indemnify Lifeline from and against all actions, claims, demands, liabilities, obligations, losses, costs (including, but not limited to legal fees, expenses and penalties) and interest suffered, incurred or sustained by or threatened against Lifeline arising out of or in connection with your use of the Lifeline Content that breaches Clause 2, which a third party alleges is unauthorised use or infringement of any of its Third Party IP.

3. Licence

3.1 Subject to Clause 2, Lifeline hereby grants to you a non-exclusive, revocable, non-assignable, non-transferable, royalty free (excluding the right to sub-licence) licence to access and use the Intellectual Property Rights owned by Lifeline in the Lifeline Content ("Lifeline IP") in accordance with the Terms and Conditions and solely for undertaking the Lifeline training program ("Limited Purpose").

3.2 The licence granted to you by Lifeline in Clause 1 does not permit you to:

(a) without limiting Clause 6, disclose the Lifeline IP to any other person, except as required for the Limited Purpose, or as Lifeline in its absolute discretion may otherwise agree to; or

(b) manufacture, sell, license, transfer, commercialise, modify, reproduce, copy, download or otherwise exploit all or any part of the Lifeline IP for any reason (including the Limited Purpose).

4. Lifeline Trade Marks

4.1 You acknowledge and agree that Lifeline is the registered owner of the following registered trade marks 395817, 657428, 889692, 889695, 1223848, 1223865, 1223871, 1223918, 1436036, 1447988, 1447994, 1472642, 1567521, 1567532, 1568370, 1568928, 1568936, 1635489, 1635498, 1740531, 1906048, 1906049 and any other trade marks registered (or that will be registered) in the name of Lifeline (collectively, the "Lifeline Trade Marks"), and as the registered owner, Lifeline has exclusive rights under the Trade Marks Act 1995 (Cth) to use and authorise other persons to use the Lifeline Trade Marks.

4.2 Without limiting any other clause, if your access or use of the Lifeline Content involves the use and application of the Lifeline Trade Marks, you will

(a) use and apply the Lifeline Trade Marks strictly in accordance with any directions issued by Lifeline; and

(b) not do anything that would diminish the value in, reputation or goodwill of the Lifeline Trade Marks.

5. Your Rights and Obligations

5.1 Except for the licence granted under Clauses 1 or otherwise expressly provided in the Terms and Conditions, Lifeline does not grant any right or licence in any Intellectual Property Rights belonging to Lifeline, whether by implication, estoppel, or otherwise.

5.2 Without limiting any other clause, you will not file any patent, trade mark, copyright, business name or other regulatory applications relating to any Lifeline Content, or otherwise any Intellectual Property Rights of Lifeline or anything confusingly or substantially similar thereto worldwide.

5.3 You agree that all use of the Lifeline Content, and any goodwill associated with Lifeline, shall vest in and is for the exclusive benefit of Lifeline.

5.4 You must promptly notify Lifeline after becoming aware of any suspected or actual infringement of Lifeline IP by you or any other person, or unauthorised use of the Lifeline Content. You must also take reasonable care to protect all such Lifeline IP and Lifeline Content from infringement, unauthorised use or damage.

5.5 Any rights granted to you to the Lifeline Content under the Terms and Conditions is subject to your prompt compliance with any directions issued by Lifeline (including under Clause 2 and Clause 4.2(a)).

6. Disclaimer

6.1 While all reasonable care has been taken in the preparation of the Lifeline Content, the Lifeline Content is intended to be for your general information and use only. To the maximum extent permitted by law, no representation or warranty of any kind, express, implied, statutory or otherwise is made by Lifeline as to the currency, reliability, accuracy or completeness of the information, opinions and conclusions, or as to the reasonableness of any assumption, contained in the Lifeline Content.

6.2 You acknowledge and agree that all, or any part of the Lifeline Content, hosted by Lifeline and accessed by you on any platform, does not expressly or impliedly:

(a) contain, provide or give access to any medical advice, diagnosis, prescription of medications or treatment of any conditions to you or any other person;

(b) in any way forms part of, or substitutes professional medical care and advice that should be tailored to and specific for each person and their individual circumstances; or

(c) indicate, suggest or recommend that you disregard professional medical advice, or delay seeking professional medical advice.

7. Exclusion of Liability

7.1 To the extent permitted by law, you release Lifeline and its affiliates, directors, officers, employees, agents, representatives or advisers from any liability including, without limitation:

(a) direct, indirect or consequential loss or damage or loss or damage suffered by you or any third party, howsoever arising;

(b) subject to clause 2, any liability arising under statutory and general law warranties and guarantees; and

7.2 If Schedule 2 of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth) ("ACL") applies, the Lifeline Content contains services supplied by Lifeline and you are a 'consumer' (as defined in the ACL), then to the extent permitted by law, Lifeline's liability for any loss suffered by you, due to Lifeline's failure to comply with any applicable (and non-excludable) consumer guarantees under the ACL, is limited to:

(a) supplying those services again; or

(b) paying the cost of having the services supplied again.

7.3 Lifeline disclaims all liability, loss, injury or damage suffered by you with respect to such information, services and materials in the Lifeline Content, whether provided by Lifeline, third party contractors or other parties.

8. Confidentiality

8.1 You must keep confidential all:

(a) Lifeline Content;

(b) information provided to you by Lifeline that is expressly stated to be confidential; and

8.2 You may not use or disclose to any other party any Confidential Information for any purpose other than that which the information was disclosed (except to the extent required by law).

9. Suspension and Revocation

9.1 You must not do anything to cause or contribute to any costs, expenses, losses, liability or damages incurred or suffered by Lifeline, including in accessing or using the Lifeline Content.

9.2 You agree that Lifeline shall be entitled to recover any reasonable costs, expenses, losses, liability or damages incurred or suffered as a result of the your failure to comply with a material term of the Terms and Conditions, including Clause 1.

9.3 Without limiting any other clause, Lifeline may in its absolute discretion revoke, suspend, limit or terminate your access to the Lifeline Content for any reason and at any time upon giving satisfactory notice.

9.4 Lifeline may request at any time that you promptly return to Lifeline, delete or destroy, all copies of all, or part of any, Lifeline Content in your possession or control, including if Lifeline exercises its rights under Clause 3. Immediately following your compliance with such a request, you must notify Lifeline in writing that such a request has been fully complied with, and if required by Lifeline, provide evidence of the deletion or destruction of all copies of all, or part of any, Lifeline Content.

10. Variation

10.1 Lifeline may waive, amend, correct, vary, update, supplement or replace the Terms and Conditions, in part or in its entirety, at any time without notice.

11. Governing Law

11.1 Any disputes that arise in relation to your access or use of the Lifeline Content will be governed by the laws in force in New South Wales, Australia.

Lifeline Training Terms and Conditions of Use - Employees and Contractors

TERMS AND CONDITIONS OF USE

Last updated on 5 July 2021

A PDF version can be downloaded here.

By electronically accepting the Terms and Conditions, you agree to be bound by the Terms and Conditions, and any Lifeline policies that are either accessible at https://www.lifeline.org.au/policies-page/ or notified to you from time to time.

The Terms and Conditions are effective and binding on and from the date of acceptance of the Terms and Conditions. Lifeline reserves the right to update and amend the Terms and Conditions in accordance with Clause 9. [You can review the latest version of these Terms and Conditions at any time at https://www.lifeline.org.au/policies-page.

1. Intellectual Property Rights

1.2 Lifeline owns all rights, title and interests in the Lifeline Content, including all associated Intellectual Property Rights.

2. Third Party IP

2.1 You acknowledge and agree that the Lifeline Content may contain the Intellectual Property Rights of a third party that has been licensed to Lifeline ("Third Party IP").

3. Licence

(a) undertaking the Lifeline training program; or

(b) delivering the Lifeline training program to Lifeline customers; or

3.2 The licence granted to you by Lifeline in Clause 1 does not permit you to:

(a) without limiting Clause 7, disclose the Lifeline IP to any other person, except as required for the Limited Purpose, or as Lifeline in its absolute discretion may otherwise agree to;

(b) manufacture, sell, license, transfer, commercialise or otherwise exploit all or any part of the Lifeline IP for any reason (including the Limited Purpose);

(i) the Limited Purpose; and

(ii) with Lifeline's prior written consent; or

(d) reproduce or copy all or any part of the Lifeline Content for any purpose, except for the Limited

4. Modifications to Lifeline Content

4.1 All Intellectual Property Rights in any modifications, developments or improvements to the Lifeline Content created by you will be automatically assigned to Lifeline immediately upon creation and Lifeline grants to you a licence back pursuant to Clause 1, without the need for any further formality or documentation.

4.2 Lifeline retains all rights to demand inspections of any modifications to Lifeline Content under Clause 3.2(c) and licenced back to you under Clause 1 at any time.

4.3 If following an inspection under Clause 2, Lifeline in its absolute discretion determines that the modification to Lifeline Content is unsatisfactory in any way, the licence granted to you under Clause 4.1 may be revoked in accordance with Clause 8.2.

5. Lifeline Trade Marks

5.1 You acknowledge and agree that Lifeline is the registered owner of the following registered trade marks 395817, 657428, 889692, 889695, 1223848, 1223865, 1223871, 1223918, 1436036, 1447988, 1447994, 1472642, 1567521, 1567532, 1568370, 1568928, 1568936, 1635489, 1635498, 1740531, 1906048, 1906049 and any other trade marks registered (or that will be registered) in the name of Lifeline (collectively, the "Lifeline Trade Marks"), and as the registered owner, Lifeline has exclusive rights under the Trade Marks Act 1995 (Cth) to use and authorise other persons to use the Lifeline Trade Marks.

5.2 Without limiting any other clause, if your access or use of the Lifeline Content involves the use and application of the Lifeline Trade Marks, you will

(a) use and apply the Lifeline Trade Marks strictly in accordance with any directions issued by Lifeline; and

(b) not do anything that would diminish the value in, reputation or goodwill of the Lifeline Trade Marks, including if Lifeline consents to any modifications to the Lifeline Content in accordance with Clause 3.2(c).

6. Your Rights and Obligations

6.1 Except for the licence granted under Clauses 1, 4.1 or otherwise expressly provided in the Terms and Conditions, Lifeline does not grant any right or licence in any Intellectual Property Rights belonging to Lifeline whether by implication, estoppel, or otherwise.

6.2 Without limiting any other clause, you will not file any patent, trade mark, copyright, business name or other regulatory applications relating to any Lifeline Content, or otherwise any Intellectual Property Rights of Lifeline or anything confusingly or substantially similar thereto worldwide.

6.3 You agree that all use of the Lifeline Content, and any goodwill associated with Lifeline, shall vest in and is for the exclusive benefit of Lifeline.

6.4 You must promptly notify Lifeline after becoming aware of any suspected or actual infringement of Lifeline IP by you or any other person, or unauthorised use of the Lifeline Content. You must also take reasonable care to protect all such Lifeline IP and Lifeline Content from infringement, unauthorised use or damage.

6.5 Any rights granted to you to the Lifeline Content under the Terms and Conditions is subject to your prompt compliance with any directions issued by Lifeline (including under Clause 2 and Clause 5.2(a)).

7. Confidentiality

7.1 You must keep confidential all:

(a) Lifeline Content;

(b) information provided to you by Lifeline that is expressly stated to be confidential; and

7.2 You may not use or disclose to any other party any Confidential Information for any purpose other than that which the information was disclosed (except to the extent required by law).

8. Suspension and Revocation

8.1 You must not do anything to cause or contribute to any costs, expenses, losses, liability or damages incurred or suffered by Lifeline, including in accessing or using the Lifeline Content.

8.2 You agree that Lifeline shall be entitled to recover any reasonable costs, expenses, losses, liability or damages incurred or suffered as a result of the your failure to comply with a material term of the Terms and Conditions, including Clause 1.

8.3 Without limiting any other clause, Lifeline may in its absolute discretion revoke, suspend, limit or terminate your access to the Lifeline Content for any reason and at any time upon giving satisfactory notice.

8.4 Lifeline may request at any time that you promptly return to Lifeline, delete or destroy, all copies of all, or part of any, Lifeline Content in your possession or control, including if Lifeline exercises its rights under Clause 3. Immediately following your compliance with such a request, you must notify Lifeline in writing that such a request has been fully complied with, and if required by Lifeline, provide evidence of the deletion or destruction of all copies of all, or part of any, Lifeline Content.

9. Variation

9.1 Lifeline may waive, amend, correct, vary, update, supplement or replace the Terms and Conditions, in part or in its entirety, at any time without notice.

10. Governing Law

10.1 Any disputes that arise in relation to your access or use of the Lifeline Content will be governed by the laws in force in New South Wales, Australia.

Accessibility

Lifeline Australia's website has been developed to ensure content is available to the widest possible audience, including readers using assistive technology or accessibility features. If there is information on this website that you cannot access, please contact us.

We aim to meet Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1. Meeting these guidelines improves accessibility and your experience.

We have implemented a variety of techniques to ensure our compliance with accessibility standards, such as:

Web pages have titles that describe topic or purpose.
We provided text alternatives for any non-text content.
The visual presentation of the majority of text and images of text has a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1.
Text can be resized without assistive technology.
All functionality of the content is operable through a keyboard interface.
A mechanism is available to bypass blocks of content that are repeated on multiple Web pages.
Web pages do not contain anything that flashes more than three times in any one second period, or the flash is below the general flash and red flash thresholds.
In content implemented using markup languages, elements have complete start and end tags, elements are nested according to their specifications, elements do not contain duplicate attributes, and any IDs are unique, except where the specifications allow these features.

This website was assessed for accessibility by an external expert evaluation and is partially conformant with WCAG 2.1 level AA. Partially conformant means that some parts of the content do not yet fully conform to full AA accessibility standard.

We are working to address this and will update this page as enhancements are released.

Accessing Lifeline in languages other than English

For instructions on how to access Lifeline crisis support through using the Translating and Interpreting Service (TIS) or the National Relay Service (NRS) please follow this link.

Access the Page: Language Support and Language Translation Services

Webchat FAQs

Chat FAQ's

If you are having problems connecting to the Lifeline Chat crisis support, please see the FAQ's below.

Why does my chat keep dropping out and why do I have to sign in again?

The most common reason for this is the use of mobile devices (eg. Phone, Tablet). Some strategies to make chatting easier while using mobile devices have been listed below:

Your internet connection/reception matters, as this will guarantee better connectivity to the Internet. You could try moving to an area of the house that has better reception (eg. closer to the router or perhaps closer to the window)
Mobile phones/ iPads will automatically adjust mobile signal power to use the least amount of battery power as possible. If possible, ensure you are plugged into a charger whilst using your device.
Since online crisis support is run through an Internet browser, try shutting down any unused applications to free up some memory/processing power on your device.
One of the common causes of a slow device, is that it has been running for a long time. A quick restart of the device may help.

Our recommendations are:

Use a personal and secure wifi network to connect to the Internet
Connect to Online Crisis Support Chat from an area with higher quality mobile phone reception
Install the latest security & system updates on your device (Android/iOS/PC/Mac)

Browser Requirements

The following will be required to run this service on your device:

Javascript
Cookies

VPN Connectivity

Connecting through a VPN service might inhibit the chat service from being accessible for your device.
Our recommendation would be not to access the service through a VPN.
Please be aware that your communication with our service is encrypted, regardless of you using a VPN or not.